Dianne Bos’ Remembrance of Time Past

The Sleeping Green

Canadian photographer Dianne Bos is interested in capturing the impression of time passing rather than decisive moments typical of most documentary photography. Her exhibition “The Sleeping Green, no man’s land 100 years later” featuring pinhole and experimental photography is at Paris’ Canadian Culture Center (until Sept. 8).

Bos’ recent work focuses on the battlegrounds of World War I. In 2014 she photographed in Belgium and France along the historic frontlines where Canadian soldiers fought near Ypres, Passchendaele, Vimy and the Somme. Using pinhole and vintage cameras Bos explores how time has changed the landscape of these historic battlegrounds.

The title of the exhibition ‘The Sleeping Green’ is taken from the 1916 Isaac Rosenberg poem “Break of Day in the Trenches.”Using traditional photographic techniques, darkroom manipulations and objects found at the sites with a technique called photograms, Bos creates images that layer site documentation and symbolic imagery.

Explaining her unique approach to documentation photography Bos says: “I’m fascinated by the history of photography and the ways different devices change our perception of time and space. Using pinhole and vintage cameras I wanted to see how time has changed the landscape of these historic battlegrounds 100 years later. In ways other than the presence of memorials, does a memory of that past persist at these sites?”